When it comes to painting and decorating the interior of your home, you’re faced with literally thousands upon thousands of choices. As a homeowner, that can be a little overwhelming if you don’t have a background in interior design!
However, there are some simple tips that can help guide you through the process of perfecting the look of your house. Of course, your personal style should still be the guiding beacon, but these tips can keep you from making disastrous mistakes that will undo any good decisions you make in your home.
Hold Off On The Paint
It makes sense to paint your walls before you start adding furniture, right? After all, you’re going to have that paint color up on the wall anyway. Actually, painting your walls before you’ve picked out your furniture, even down to accessories, is the wrong move.
When you put paint up first you’re limiting your décor choices. A sofa or table that you love may not work with one shade of paint, but work perfectly well with one just a few shades lighter or darker.
If you paint after you pick your furniture you won’t have that problem since you can make sure the paint color works with everything you’ve chosen for a given room.
Focus On What You Need
Decorating your home can feel a bit like running wild in a candy store. However, simply choosing items that you like isn’t really the best way to go about the task.
Instead, what you really need to do is make a list of items that you already have and want to use. In some cases, you may be able to use all of them, though others may need to be sold based on your overall plan for the room.
From there, you can begin to figure out which quality pieces of furniture are the most important. For example, you might need a sofa or side chairs for your living room. Start with those pieces and find them first before moving on.
That doesn’t mean you can’t keep your eye out for other great items while you shop, but making snap decisions based on what you like can be very limiting later on. Get what you need most first and work from there.
Always Get Paint Samples
When you pick out paint at your local home improvement or paint store it can be tempting to grab a bunch of paint chips, take them home and stick them on the wall. However, this really isn’t a very good way of deciding on whether or not a paint color is right for your space.
While you can go ahead and take those paint chips home to think about what color you like best, you really need to narrow down your choices and buy small samples before making a final decision. Paint a small section of your wall with the colors still in the running and live with it for a few days.
That way you’ll be able to see what your paint color will look like in the brightest part of the day and middle of the night in your chosen room. The sample might be the exact color, but that doesn’t mean that’s how it will look in your space.
Painting your home and choosing the décor can seem complicated but it really doesn’t have to be if you simply follow the three steps above. They’re the most essential tips you should be using to guide you, and they really are the principles that most interior designers use to build a space for their clients.
Take your time and be patient – you can have the home you’ve always wanted!
This article can be found at http://www.harrishousepainting.com/blog/
Image courtesy of winnond at FreeDigitalPhotos.net